Deckard didn’t hesitate. “Of course.”
With his direction, Evylin rose and hurried into the trees where Deckard said the ghost would be. Sure enough, he was waiting readily. His scruffy beard and unruly hair didn’t ruffle in the cold evening breeze. His military coat stretched across his broad shoulders yet showed no more wear than on the day he’d died.
“Now,” Hewitt said, voice a soothing rumble, “what’s bothering you?”
Evylin smiled forlornly. “Many things,” she admitted.
He waited patiently.
With a sigh, Evylin leaned against an elm. “I don’t know what to do,” she whispered.
“In regard to what?”
“Life.” She scoffed at the grandiosity of that sentiment. “If we make it through this, I’m going to live for roughly two hundred years, maybe more. I love Jonn, I’m happy being with him, and I know those two hundred years are going to be...so full. Full of everything good.”
Evylin paused, scanning her uncle’s face. “And yet, I don’t know what I want any more now than I did three months ago.”
Hewitt gave her a dry smile. “Adventure isn’t what the storybooks say, is it?”
“Not even a little.”
He dipped his chin, compassion in his gaze even as he fell silent.
Evylin sighed. “When we were children,” she murmured, almost afraid to speak the words, “Ryen and I made all these grand plans. We were going to travel the world. And after he died, I thought that dream was lost even as I clung to it.”
“It’s why I got you out,” Hewitt said.
“I know.” She smiled sadly. “I knew even then—when you convinced Jonn and me to marry. All of this was meant to give me our dream. To give Ryen our dream, even if he couldn’t be here with me.”
Hewitt’s silence was confirmation.
“But the problem is, Uncle,” she said. “I don’t think I want it anymore. I don’t think I wanted it even then. Because I didn’t know what it was. Instead, I blindly followed our plans, thinking that even without Ryen, adventure was still what I desired.”
“You find that it isn’t?”
She tipped her head in thought. “No, I—I do desire it. But I think I’ve discovered that it isn’t enough. It isn’tallthat I want—traveling the world, going from one adventure to the next. I want more.”
“And what is that more?” Hewitt asked.
“I don’t know.” Evylin let out a low hum of bemusement. “Isn’t that awful? I want more, but I don’t know why what I have isn’t good enough.”
“Then you should ask yourself why,” he advised.
Evylin frowned into the darkness of the night, attempting to do as he said. Why wasn’t what she already had enough? After years of pining and hoping, she had the adventure for which she’d longed. She lived like the heroes in her novels, like the legends she and Ryen swore to become one day themselves. To make it even better, she was married to a man she loved, one who was determined to give her a life full of the adventure she craved.
So why wasn’t it enough?
“I don’t like this game,” Evylin said in good-natured agitation. “It confuses me.”
Hewitt chuckled. “You don’t have to figure it out in one moment, Evie. Most people don’t figure it out in their entire lifetime. As you have two to three times that ahead of you, don’t worry so much. You have time.”
“Do I, though?” Evylin shook her head. “We are assisting the Alliance’s overthrow of two monarchies. If we are successful, they hope to place us in a role as part of their governing leadership. I’ll admit I’m not entirely certain what that might look like, but I don’t doubt they’ll require us to make a choice the instant Allund is reestablished. But if I don’t know what I want before that day, how am I supposed to make that choice?”
Hewitt considered her, tugging on his beard. “They want you to lead?”
“As a Bonded couple, yes,” she confirmed. “They want us to carry the Space Relic and take on a role in the newly formed government.”
“Interesting,” he muttered. Then he gave her an inquisitive look. “What is Deckard’s take on this?”
